Snow impact in Florida

Sally

Okay, it didn't snow in Florida but....An exempt employee took vacation the end of last week to take his son to look at a college in New York. The employee was due back at work yesterday, but did not show (and did not call). Presumably, since it was a driving trip, he was stuck somewhere along the I-95 corridor and was not back at work because of the weather. The few other times someone has been delayed returing to work from vacation because of weather problems the employee has had to use additional vacation time. This situation is not specifically covered in the employee handbook. I'm anticipating his supervisor balking at the notion the employee would have to use additional vacation time, but he wasn't sick and it doesn't qualify as emergency leave under our policies (that is for a death in the immediate family) or personal time off (which we define at time used for doctor appts. and is taken in increments of hours, not entire days). I'm basing this on past practice, but am I being unreasonable?
Don--I know you have some words of wisdom for me!

Rockie

We had some employees that were delayed coming back from vacation in the snow bound area. We are just asking them to use PTO days for this, but not charging as an unscheduled absence. I guess what would bother me more would be that the employee did not give the courtesy of a call when they couldn't come in. Could be there was a good reason for it, but usually there is a phone somewhere close by unless you are stuck in a snow drift.

mbeam

We have a PTO (paid time off policy) in place to account for time missed from work. It has been well-received by our workforce when compared to our old vacation/sick time policy. In the scenario you describe, we would deduct from the individual's PTO bank.

I would recommend the use of PTO banks to anyone as it treats adults as adults holding them accountable for the use of their time. As long as they have time left in their PTO bank (both exempt and non-exempt) they are able to take scheduled time off. For unscheduled, we still deduct from the PTO bank (as long as it's not FMLA) which may count as an unscheduled absence against our attendance policy.

We recently updated our associate handbook and ran the changes past both our consultants and our attorney. This passed scrutiny by both and has made our managers jobs and our in HR much easier.

Whatever

There are two issues. The weather was unusually terrible along the mid-atlantic states. The issue is not what the supervisor wants, but what company policy is. You should treat this the same as you have in the past when an employee couldn't return to work because of weather. The second issue is why the ee didn't call. Do you have a policy about calling in? If not, you should.

Sally

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 02-19-03 AT 11:23AM (CST)[/font][p]Yes, we do have a policy about calling in when an employee is going to be absent. I realize these were extenuating circumstances. But I also realize many people today have cell phones. I doubt the employee was stuck in his vehicle the entire time, so I do feel he could have placed a phone call somehow.
As a side note--I was stranded in an airport during bad winter weather in the days before cell phones and don't ya know I found a payphone that I used to call my office!

Hatchetman

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 02-19-03 AT 01:04PM (CST)[/font][p]For an exempt employee, you may dock the full days' absences from the weekly salary since the absences were for personal reasons. There doesn't have to be any time on the books to cover it. FLSA permits the docking of the salary for full days' absences due to personal reasons, as diferentiated from full days' absences due to sickness or disability (when there does need to be a sick leave plan or policy in place to be able to dock the salary).

Further, if he didn't call in and you consider that he didn't report timely (his absence wasn't approved), you don't have to pay the exempt employee even if there is PTO on the books. And course, you then can then hold him "accountable" for failing to report. But talk to him first and get his explanation, before deciding whether or not the absences will be approved.